I don't have MegaT yet so this may be way off base.
Seems to me some (or a lot) of this mass/volume inconsistency might
go away if the guys at GDW trashed the mass independent drive and
introduced some new lightweight super-strong metal/alloy/plastic.
Going from the armor type list in Striker, armor gets lighter with
a TL 7 composite, and then everything gets heavy. Sure, the armor
value to weight ratio increases, but the density starts heading for
neutron star.
Of course, then you'd have to come up with a good reason why said
armor is only used on spacecraft. Maybe it degrades outside of a
vacuum, and you can't coat it for some reason. That'd be a better
reason for all the larger ships being non-atmosphere capable than
streamlining. I mean c'mon, if a battleship can pull 6 g's, it can
certainly match speeds with a planet's rotating atmosphere and make
a soft landing.
- --
John H. Kim
[email removed]
[email removed]